I’ve gotten some flak for my 13 Problems Unique to White People post. One complaint was that I was crazy for forwarding the notion that “sex with children should not necessarily be a crime.”

While I recognize and appreciate that child molestation and statutory rape laws are there to protect children, I think that many of the laws are poorly conceived and written, and dictate punishments disproportionate to the crime.

The story of Genarlow Wilson makes news readers uncomfortable – and sends a shiver down the spines of the parents of teenagers. It is something they will have to get used to now that the Rev. Al Sharpton, the radical black politician and the undisputed king of the street protest has decided to become involved.

Back in 2003, Wilson was a 17-year-old pupil getting top grades and showing enough promise as a footballer to catch the attention of Ivy League schools. Popular among students and teachers, he was voted Homecoming King, an honour bestowed on a star student or athlete.

Today Wilson is two years into a 10-year prison sentence for having consensual oral sex with a 15-year old girl at a New Year’s Eve party three years ago.

The age of consent in Georgia is 16 and the law at the time required a minimum 10-year prison sentence for the crime. A peculiarity of Georgia’s laws made it a “a misdemeanour for teenagers less than three years apart to have sexual intercourse,” but a felony for them to have oral sex.

Like many states, oral sex in Georgia has always been covered under the sodomy laws – designed primarily to outlaw gay sex. As recently as 1998, even oral sex between husband and wife was illegal, punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

Wilson was convicted of aggravated child molestation, and that carried a mandatory 10 years without parole. His case quickly gained national notoriety but to little effect. Every attempt to have the case thrown out has ended in failure.

Mr Sharpton’s involvement is certain to raise the temperature further. On Thursday, he addressed cheering crowds at a protest rally outside the county courthouse in Douglasville. “We’re here today because what affects you affects all of us,” he told the protesters.

In the latest twist, a Superior Court judge canceled a hearing that could have seen Wilson released today because there is a law that prohibits appeal bonds for people convicted of his crime and who have been sentenced to five years or more in prison. So, even though the state legislature has changed the law and it has become the laughing stock of the country, Wilson remains in jail.

On New Year’s Eve 2003, Wilson and his friends were having the sort of party that is every parent’s nightmare. When police searched the room at the local Days Inn hotel, they found evidence of underage drinking, used condoms and a video camera.

The TV programme Primetime got its hands on the tape which shows Wilson, then 17, having sex with a seemingly drunk 17-year-old girl. She was earlier filmed passed out on the bathroom floor. Another section of the tape shows a second girl, 15 at the time, having oral sex with several boys in succession. Wilson was one of them. The girl later said she had not been drinking on the night in question.

The next morning, Wilson’s life was turned upside down when he learnt that the 17-year-old had gone to the police to report that she’d been raped.

“I was, like, ‘What? When was this happening? Did this happen at the same party I was at?'” Wilson told Primetime. “It was shocking to me.”

Six boys, including Wilson, were arrested on various charges, including rape.

Wilson maintained his innocence, saying “it was consensual, I wouldn’t have … if it wasn’t consensual. I’m not that kind of person. No means no.” The five other boys made plea bargains.

But Wilson – the only one without a police record – refused. “He wasn’t going to prison willingly,” said his lawyer, Michael Mann. “He wasn’t going to plea to something in his mind he didn’t do.”

He stood trial in February 2005 and the jury moved swiftly to acquit Wilson of raping the 17-year-old. But jurors felt they had no choice under the law but to find him guilty of aggravated child molestation.

Only later did they learn that it carried an automatic 10-year sentence without parole and that he would be forced to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.

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The article says that “Wilson was convicted of aggravated child molestation” and that after his release from prison “he would be forced to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.” Sure, the law has been changed since, and the dude was released after two years, but the fact remains that he had to spend two years in prison for receiving a blow job when he was 17 from a sober, willing 15-year-old. And for a while there, he was officially a child molestor. Call me immoral, but I think that’s a little fucked up.

And according to my research, the amended Georgia laws aren’t much better:

16-6-4. (a) A person commits the offense of child molestation when he or she does any immoral or indecent act to or in the presence of or with any child under the age of 16 years with the intent to arouse or satisfy the sexual desires of either the child or the person.

This means that an 18-year-old who bangs a 15-year-old, regardless of the nature of their relationship, is technically a child molestor.

I realize that this is just one example, but perhaps it’ll encourage those who railed against my sex with children statement to think twice before getting their panties in a bunch.

3 Responses to Why Child Molestation Should Not Always Be Illegal

This is a difficult subject, and you have a great point. Some of these boundary lines, these mid-spectrum cases, are too grey. What happens when you account for psychological age? Mental illness? Blackout states? The laws need more subtlety, more precedent, and more definition of more exceptions. This is usually the case with the law. THE LAW!